Washington DC
It took Georgia officials more than two months to charge Ahmaud Arbery’s assassins with murder.
The killers may never have been charged - and later tried and convicted - without the presence two months later of video showing them hunting Arbery down. It also took tough, enterprising journalism from Brunswick News police reporter Larry Hobbs to gain some measure of justice. Hobbs was the only reporter at any level to keep the story alive. Without him, the case would likely have faded away and The New York Times would never have taken a much-belated interest in it.
Hobbs gives real journalism a good name, especially the local variety that has become an endangered species. CNN, MSNBC, NPR, and the traditional news divisions at ABC, CBS, and NBC routinely come under fire, as they sometimes should. Doing so prompts lamentable and ill-informed generalizations, however, about the decline of American journalism. Please, in the name of democracy, don’t paint with that broad a brush.
What gets lost when people conflate hard news reporting with broadcast infotainment is the serious work of investigative, print reporters in cities and towns across this nation. Hobbs is a superb case in point. He was stunned that week after week transpired without law enforcement officials taking any action. He worried that the entire matter would be literally whitewashed away without justice and accountability.
The case shifted from one prosecutor to another and still … nothing. Hobbs was being stonewalled by Georgia authorities telling them that, “The less answers you give us, the more questions we ask.” His suspicions were aroused for many reasons, not the least of which was that one of the murderers previously worked for the local district attorney.
Hobbs filed a public records request with the local police in an attempt to understand why a young man was gunned down by vigilantes on a quiet neighborhood street and authorities were doing nothing about it. He was relentless in pursuit of the truth, which eventually forced the hands of Georgia officials.
Every authoritarian’s playbook seeks to diminish journalism and those who practice it. It’s a tired, pathetic, and predictable cliche, but it works. As democracy hangs in the balance over the next decade - and yes, things are going to get worse - we will need hard-news, print journalists like Larry Hobbs to speak truth to power, shine light in dark and dangerous places, and hold the bastards accountable.
